Innovation waves and technological transitions: Sweden, 1909-2016

There are important unresolved questions about long-term trends of in- novation activity and the nature of the interplay between innovation and economic development and transformation. This study explores the promise of a literature-based innovation output indicator, constructed for the Swedish engineering industry, 1909-2016. The findings suggest a long-run increasing trend in innovations per capita. Meanwhile, product innovations have also become more complex and it is suggested that crude innovation counts underestimate the long-run innovation performance. In order to analyse innovation and economic development across different frequencies, the study uses a wavelet decomposition approach. The results suggest that innovation activity has surged in periods of intense industry rationalization and struc- tural crisis (1930s, 1970s and 2010s) and that such pulses were intimately connected to the second and third industrial revolutions.